What’s Up: There are three types of Jamón Ibérico and they all come from a pig's leg. Meat-elites claim Jamón Ibérico de bellota is the best. Just as with us, the climate where the pigs live and the food they eat affect their flavor. The pigs that eventually turn into Jamón Ibérico de bellota only eat acorns (bellotas) for the last 3 months of their lives. It's worth noting that pigs actually like acorns, so it's not a foie-gras liver exploding force-feeding-tube scenario.

Where: Il Buco Alimentari & Vineria - NYC

Why: This is one of the most luxuriously cured meats in the world and when someone offers to treat you to some, you say YES and put it in your mouth!

How: The Jamón was thinly shaved into a pile on a white plate. We ate it plain-jane mostly or with a little piece of their tasty homemade bread. The more I ate the more I grasped the flavor-profile. Merely thinking of grisly-fat tissue makes me gag, but the fat marbled into this red meat actually melts in your mouth like butter.

My Reaction: My friend told me I would like it, and hot damn I did! Though I must be honest and admit I’d prefer a slice of salty country ham over this any day.

Final Thought: So the fanciest ham in the universe actually comes from “low on the hog?” Granny always said it was from high.

Once upon a time recently, I went to dinner with 3 men. (go me!) Two random things learned:

1. "Women can under-express the physical qualities we appreciate in men."

2. "It sounds funny when women pretend they're into a man's ass, because guy's butts are really just ugly."

I just quote.

I told them about a woman's comment posted under the That's What She Said teaser when it was posted by the wicked awesome Edith Zimmerman over at The Hairpin. These guys were pretty fascinated, and I thought I should post it here in case you missed it! Her handle is @ilikemints, and she's responding to this interview with Cindy Gallop.

I watched these with my boyfriend in the room, and when I got to Cindy's, where she tells the story of her friend getting turned on by the dude's forearm, he got really confused. He had never heard of the male forearm as a sexy body part before, or what made a forearm sexy. I had to do an image search to show him, explain why that was a big part of why dudes in bands tend to get ladies even if they're ugly (he has been in bands for almost 15 years!), because playing guitars and drums get dudes' forearms ripped. He knew that women like guys' bodies, but had never really thought deeply about individual male physical attributes that had merit or were valued in any specific way, other than general "that dude's really muscular, most girls want that", and that on the whole men's bodies were goofy and relatively inconsequential, and I get the sense that a lot of guys feel that way, too.

On the whole this idea makes me very sad because not only does it do a great disservice to the intricacies of male-directed desire, but also to the way many men view their own bodies as being sexually neutral except for their dicks. I know I'm not completely happy with my body, but there are parts that I love that make me feel sensual and sexy, like the smallness of my waist, the fullness of my hips and ass, the delicate lines of my collarbone. Having these areas shown off and touched by someone I want to do the sex with help make me more confident in myself and make me a better partner. I think if a lot of dudes who feel down on or apathetic towards their bodies knew about the female gaze and how certain parts of them made women feel would be more confident in those qualities and be better at sex than having it all wrapped up in dick size, which, personally, I'm not that worried about.

Worth noting is that my three friends proceeded to roll up their sleeves and show a little more flesh last night. Let's just say I got to gawk at their sexy winterized forearms the rest of the night. Not bad.

October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month. The National Cancer Institute says one out of eight women will be diagnosed in their lifetime. 1 out of 8! Learn something about the disease and then teach your buddies about it. And while you're at it, go get a PAP.

Is your passion holy? Or filthy? Is there a difference? Could Patriarch Kirill tell the difference? Would we care if the Pussy Riot girls weren't hot?

What's more of a lightening bolt to your crotch? Tebow, or the fact that a second string quarterback gets endorsement deals bigger than... everyone?

Would your desire or your passion be more useful if you worked at NASA? Could your passion for space-rock trump your desire for that hot mess in a spacesuit? Would you put on a diaper and drive cross-country?

I played funk with my father and new husband and we brought down the rain.

I permanently scarred my feet with something blue.

I went to the mountains and explored a stunning cave. A young German boy obviously didn't understand English, because he didn't understand that you NO TOUCHINGS STALAGMITES!

I navigated through some legitimate scramble. After a 15-20 minute mortality-meditation concerning a death-defying-crevice-leap in the midst of a 5 hour hike, I negotiaKated with my fear of heights, leapt, and made it to the top.

I learned how to do more with a charcoal grill than merely watch some schmuck use it. Here's an iPhone 4 image of my sweet, tenderly, grilled-pork, perched next to the most brilliant discovery a gal can make on a brief stay in a small Shenandoah town----> Dippin' Dots!

After this short, yet deeply enlightening pause, what's next for us here at TWSS Project? This next week we're exploring fear. Of a wedding?... Fear of heights?.... Fear of taking time off? Impermanence? Fear of permanence? Getting in front of a camera? Snakes?

​If you haven't seen any of Clayton Cubitt's videos of "Hysterical Literature," here's one for your viewing pleasure. Women reading to the camera while something slowly develops under the table! It's pretty clear once you start watching. What's fascinating is the connection to the breath, the resonation of the words, the break-down of self-editing. Last week we posted this video a reader shared with us, describing what happens to the brain during an orgasm.

The lateral orbitofrontal cortex is turned off which controls self-evaluation, reason and control...this shuts down fear and anxiety

I chose this one since I'm a big fan of Uncle Walt. Video after the fold. {NSFW}

I want to have children, and I wave that flag proudly. My late-night go-to drinking topic of colonics has turned to babies over the past few years. Purging of a more lovely product I say. I can't explain my desire to be a mother in any other way besides beinghorny to have children. Not in THAT way. It's just different from any desire I've felt, except lust. It feels outside of my body, or inside of my body, or of my body. Well, now I'll never hold another child until I have my own...

A few of my high-school girlfriends swore they'd never have children. Back in those days a lot of high-school girls, or maybe just my crew, were scared of the physical pain of sex, so of course having a baby freaked them out. For others, saying they didn't want children seemed rebellious, bold, more unique. They separated themselves from what was assumed to be our shared dream as ladies, and probably upset their own mamas.

As an adult, especially in NYC, I've met many women with zero baby-making interest, which I find powerful. Not because they don't want to have babies specifically, but because knowing what you want is powerful. And communicating what you want is powerful, especially when a lot of people question, "Why not?" I'm never really asked "Why?" when I say I do want kids. Communicating what you want to your partner is vital, as is clearly knowing what they want. I'll pass this off to the post that got me thinking about this: Read it and check out the rest of the Urban Honking too.

I really understand your desire to get things firmed up. You want to know where you stand, you want to be able to talk about your future with your dude without Potential Future Ghost Baby lurking above every conversation. I am someone who likes things to be very firmed up (that’s what she said) so I empathize. However, I know that lots of people do not like to firm things up, preferring instead to just “let things happen.” This lifestyle gives me hives, but is apparently quite popular, judging by almost everyone on the earth I am even vaguely friends with. So, you guys are struggling with a kind of mild difference in vibe that I think is not that big a deal.

If I were you I guess I’d be a little worried that your dude’s loosey-goosey stoner ambivalence actually indicated that deep down he kind of wanted kids. Which would make me even more frantic to firm that decision up.